FOURTEEN

I walked by my house before I went to Finny’s. I didn’t realize I was going that way until I was already there, standing outside the window. I saw Mom upstairs, sheer white curtains revealing a silhouette hugging her knees to her chest, rocking back and forth on the bed. I heard U2’s “With or Without You” at full volume, which meant she was thinking about Dad. She had probably assumed we’d moved on—new town, new school and the appearance of actual friends. But then I almost got expelled again, reminding her that no matter how far she went, his crazy would always be with her—in the form of a living, breathing, fourteen-year-old me.

“I thought Peeping Toms were supposed to have fun,” Walt said, appearing beside me.

I threw my arms around him, fingers sinking into fur.

“Hello to you, too,” he said, holding me, replacing my frustration with calm. His hugs were the ultimate Zen move. “Rough night?”

“You have no idea,” I said, letting go and wiping my tears on my sleeve. “Or maybe you do.”

“Sorry,” he said. “I had a gig in Vancouver.”

He pointed to the black bandanna tied around his head. I hadn’t even noticed it, or the black leather wristbands with tassels that he twirled around.

“How’d it go?” I asked.

“Two encores,” he said. “Walt and the Pandas rocked it. But how was your night?”

“I told my mom about you,” I said.

Walt stood back and put his paws over his chest. “I’m honored, truly.”

“It was an accident,” I said, bending down to smell a flower that had no smell. “She wasn’t ready to hear that I was seeing things again, much less that I like to stroll the suburbs with my second-best friend who’s a panda.”

“Again,” Walt said, bowing, “honored.”

“I’m glad you feel that way,” I said. “Because I need a favor.”

“Name it.”

I stopped in front of the yard that had two angel fountains in front.

“I need you to appear to my mom,” I said.

He laughed. “And I need you to play guitar in my band. It would be awesome, but it’s not going to happen.”

“Why not?” I asked.

“I don’t have the authority to appear to anyone but you,” he said. “It’s against the rules of the High Panda Council.”

“Wait, you have a boss? And there are rules?”

“First, everyone has some kind of boss,” he said. “And rules are there to protect people. You’re my client, not your mother, so I can only appear to you. Unlike pizza with sausage and mushrooms, I’m not meant to be shared.”

“But you’re evidence!” I said. “Like souvenirs. That’s what convinced Finny these are more than hallucinations.”

“So show your mom a souvenir,” he said.

“They’re too common,” I said. “You see keys, whistles and guitar picks everywhere. And while I know they’re from somewhere else, I can’t prove it to my mom. You, on the other hand, are irrefutable.”

“And scary,” Walt said. “She would completely freak out.”

“Yeah, but at least she’d know there was something else going on,” I said. “She was married to my dad, so she’s familiar with the unexplained. One whiff of that, and she’ll call off the whole psychiatrist-leading-to-loony-bin thing.”

“Would that I could,” he said, waltzing along the sidewalk. “But I cannot.”

The calmer he was, the more agitated I became. “You’re supposed to be helping me,” I said. “How is this helping? And don’t give me some crap about how the best guidance is within myself.”

“But it’s true,” he said. “There’s always a solution. Just because I’m not it doesn’t mean that a solution doesn’t exist.”

“I couldn’t be less in the mood for your fortune cookie wisdom,” I said, kicking a row of bushes.

“I know you’re angry,” he said. “But rules are rules.”

“You never struck me as a goody two-shoes,” I said, walking ahead of him.

“Only when it comes to this stuff,” he said. “But I’m not going anywhere. I’m here. It’s still my job to guide you.”

He stood under a streetlamp, which gave him an angelic glow, although I knew better.

“Guiding me where?” I said. “I don’t need to know where Finny lives, we’re here. What I don’t know is where to go next.”

“You know how this works,” Walt said, putting his hands together in front of him like a prayer. “It’s up to you to pave the path. I’m just here to point out markers along the way.”

He bowed and then he was gone, but there, through the window, was Finny. Waving. Standing smack-dab in the middle of my path.

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“Chocolate soda?”

I walked through the back door and into the kitchen to see Finny standing by two parfait glasses half filled with chocolate syrup.

“You waited for me,” I said, but I wasn’t surprised. Waiting wasn’t so bad when you knew the other person would show up. “Can I help?”

“Get the ice cream,” Finny said, motioning to the freezer.

Mrs. Jackson’s kitchen was the epitome of a happy homemaker’s house—matching flowered wallpaper and curtains, mixing bowls and tea towels. It was hard to imagine living in a place where things happened like clockwork—chicken enchiladas on Tuesdays and tuna salad on Thursdays. A place where aprons were worn while baking to keep messes to a minimum. I was the girl with cake batter in her hair, egg on her shirt and her foot in her mouth. Always.

Finny poured club soda into each glass and stirred. Then he scooped two small mounds of vanilla into each, making the concoctions bubble and fizz.

“What happened with your mom?”

I shrugged as I squirted a generous helping of whipped cream in each glass.

“Really?” he said, adding straws. “That’s all I get?”

I took a sip of my soda.

“She wants to send me away.”

“To camp? Boarding school?”

I took the straw out of my mouth, raised my hands above my head and waved them around, making a kooky face.

“To Crazyville?”

“Almost,” I said. “She wants me to see a psychiatrist.”

“Oh,” he said. And then it sank in. “Oh.”

“I’m as good as locked up,” I said, slurping. “You and I both know souvenirs won’t keep me out of the mental ward.”

“Your mom wouldn’t do that to you.”

“No, but a psychiatrist would,” I said. “And you didn’t see Mom. It was the worst fight we’ve ever had.”

“Whatever she said, I’m sure she didn’t mean it,” he said.

“She meant it,” I said. Very, very far from normal. “She just didn’t mean to say it.”

I drained the rest of my soda and then, when it was empty, I spooned ice cream into my mouth like a panacea.

“What are you going to do?”

“What are we going to do?” I said, smiling. “I can’t go home without a plan, which means we need to put the Normalcy Project into overdrive. Can you handle it?”

“Handle it? I’m already on it.”

“Like a pro,” I said, raising my parfait glass so we could toast, which we did. “So what’s next?”

“That’s easy,” Finny said. “Your dad.”

Thanks to The Cure, Mom and Finny, Dad was no longer on the no-talk list. He was everywhere. We put our glasses in the sink and, high on chocolate and whipped cream, moved the party to the dining room. I don’t know if it was the flowers on the rugs, curtains and chairs (Finny wasn’t exaggerating) or the chocolate, but I was feeling inspired. And somewhat ready to talk about Dad. Finny brought out lined paper and colored pencils for charts and legal pads and pens for taking notes.

I told him everything about my dad that he didn’t already know, which didn’t contain much in the science department. Most of the information about my dad happened after work or on breaks from inventing, so it was more crazy than scientific. Finny was convinced the two were related, though.

“We have to think bigger,” he said. “Where Western medicine fails—”

“Physics prevails?” I said.

“Hopefully,” he said. “Since your hallucinations aren’t of the normal variety, I shouldn’t be using basic theories to solve them.”

“So what’s the most controversial theory out there?” I said.

“In theoretical physics? Anything having to do with string theory,” Finny said. “Did your dad ever mention it?”

Dad worked on lots of stuff like model trains made out of tin boxes, lectures about lollipops and poems about space written on scraps of paper. I was sure there was some string in there somewhere.

“Not specifically,” I said. “All I know about it is what we’ve learned in class so far.”

Finny stood up, letting his chair fall to the floor. “Follow me.”

He sat on the couch, I sat beside him, and he got a ball of purple yarn out of the drawer in the coffee table.

“Are we making friendship bracelets?” I said. “I’m touched.”

“No,” he said. “String theory.”

He cut off a piece of yarn with scissors and tied the two ends together, making a loop. He put one end of the loop around his thumbs, the other around his pinky fingers and stretched and then flexed his fingers, pulling the string taut.

“This is the universe.”

“I always knew it was purple,” I said.

“Now, imagine the universe is made up of small strings,” he said, taking his right index finger and picking up the string that ran across the left palm and pulling it across. Then he did the same thing with the left side until the yarn crossed back and forth in the middle, making big Xs. Just like cat’s cradle.

“These strings—gazillions of them—vibrate in the eleven dimensions we can’t see,” he said, shaking his hands like jazz hands.

“Like we talked about in class!” I said, plucking one of the strings in the middle.

“Exactly,” he said. “And they’re constantly splitting and reconnecting with other strings to form even more particles that make up, well, everything.”

“It’s cool,” I said. “I’m just not sure what it has to do with me.”

Finny looked so excited I almost regretted saying it.

“Physicists—like your dad, probably—believe that if we can understand the way strings move, we can understand nature itself. And if we can understand nature . . .”

His logic fell over me like rain.

“We can understand everything,” I said. “Including my episodes?”

“That’s the idea,” he said. “At least, that’s my idea.”

“Yes!” I said. I went to hug him, but he held his hands taut, like he was afraid of destroying the universe. So I pinched the two Xs, one in each hand, and pushed them down and outside, opening up the center. I’d played this game before. Then I pointed my fingers down and scooped them through the middle while Finny let the universe slide from his hands to mine.

We played cat’s cradle back and forth while Finny reminded me of things I’d heard from Dad but forgot, like how Einstein explored atoms and stars with his theory of relativity and space warps, the big bang and black holes with his theory of general relativity. He also told me how string theory was often called the ultimate theory, or the theory of everything. I loved the idea that everything, even hallucinating, could be explained by a single equation. As if all the chaos in my life could be solved with a word problem.

Dad liked crosswords because they were word problems and equations because they were numbers problems. He never heard a question he didn’t try to answer or meet a puzzle he didn’t attempt to solve, which was annoying and amazing. No matter what it was, though, he always used the same tool: science. Just like someone else I knew.

“It’s a part of the path,” I said.

Thunder boomed and then huge raindrops fell, hitting the roof like drums.

“What path?”

“Someone has a theory that my episodes are part of a bigger picture,” I said. “That I’m on some path and they’re actually part of it.”

“Whose theory is that?” Finny said.

“I’ll tell you later,” I said. “What’s important is that the path led me to you. And you—my little Einstein—are leading us to Dad.”

I wasn’t sure where Dad would lead, but at least it would be forward.

“Dad’s the only other person on the planet who seems to have experienced what I’m experiencing,” I said. “He may not know what it is or how to stop it, but I have to think he knows more than I do.”

“And I have to think it will have something to do with string theory,” Finny said. “See? Scientists can have internal guidance, too. So what’s next?”

Year One I pleaded with Mom to take me to him, to give me back my dad.

Year Two I begged a little less.

Year Three we moved to San Francisco, and I entered the angry phase. If he didn’t need me, I didn’t need him. But then I had an episode, and I wanted him to appear, for a moment. When he didn’t show up, I returned to the angry phase and never looked back.

I guess it was time for Year Four.

“We have to find my dad,” I said. Which meant I needed to forgive him.

How to Forgive Your Dad So He Can Maybe Save Your Life
by Sophie Sophia

1. Forgive him.
2. Say it out loud so you mean it.
3. It’s okay if you don’t feel it yet. It takes time.
4. Remember it’s not for him, it’s for you. Forgiveness with an agenda.
5. Since the agenda is saving your life, fake it if you have to. Maybe one day you’ll actually feel it.

“It’s late,” Finny said, opening a pine chest and pulling a carnation-covered comforter and pillow out of it. He threw them on the couch, setting up camp, but I protested.

“I’m way too amped to sleep,” I said. “Can I sleep out here and watch a movie on your laptop instead?”

“Sure,” he said, handing me his backpack. “But don’t stay up too late. I want to start early. I think you’re on to something.”

“I think I am, too,” I said. I had to be. Straitjackets weren’t my style. Neither was a padded room. “Good night, Finn.”

“Good night,” he said.

The door to his room clicked, and I leaned against the side of the couch, legs stretched out long under the comforter. It was cozy down there, surrounded by all those flowers, which was perfect. I had work to do. I opened Google and typed in two words I never thought I’d type: Angelino Sophia.

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Dad’s name, Angelino, meant “the spirit messenger God sent to men.” He loved to tell people that, like it excused the crazy stuff he did. “Give me a break,” he’d say. “I’m a spirit messenger.” But I always wondered—what kind of message did he send by leaving us? And more than that, what kind of God sends a message to a ten-year-old girl that her father doesn’t want to be with her anymore?

In addition to my father’s name, I Googled academics, physics, thesis, dimensions, hallucinations, brain studies, Einstein, string theory, psychosis, NYU professor, controversial theory. Episodes. Eccentric. Abandoner. And Where the heck are you?

The Internet made it way too easy to find someone, which is why, when you couldn’t find them, it was more frustrating than usual. Even if he didn’t do social media or blog, Dad should have been somewhere, in a group shot on Flickr or an alumni list. But he wasn’t anywhere, which made me think the same held true for the real world. Except if he’d died, at least there’d be an obituary.

I set the laptop on the coffee table and snuggled under the covers for a minute. Think, Sophie, think. If you wanted to hide, where would people go to find you? The library? The thrift shop? The museum? The record store? If I disappeared, the best way to find me would be to go to the most interesting place in the area, the spot where curiosity and inspiration collided. There were tons of sites like that on the Internet, but only one that was doing it before the web was even invented.

“Got it!” I said, opening a new window and going where I always went when I wanted to find anything: the New York Times. Not only did it have the best stories, it also had the best search option, one that should have made all the other search options run away in shame. I typed in Dad’s name plus theoretical physics plus NYU. And then I hit the button I hoped would change everything: All Since 1851.

Since none of the links were an exact match, I skimmed the stories, looking for clues. And when I clicked on “Quarks and Professors, Reunited,” I found one. It was a photo of a bunch of older guys standing in three rows holding a poster with a colored circle on it surrounded by lines and other colored circles. It said “The Quarks Society,” and there, in the back row, was my dad.

He was smiling, the kind of smile you give when you’re really happy, hanging out with friends. According to the article, this group was formed in the late eighties to focus on theoretical physics. I scanned the photo, looking for more clues, but none of the members looked familiar except for the guy standing next to my dad. The list said his name was Dr. Perratto. He had let me nap on his couch when Dad wasn’t ready to leave campus yet and given me bags of chips from the vending machines. It was nice to have another place to hang when Dad was running late or forgot about me, which happened more than it should have.

According to the article, Dad was a founding member but hadn’t been at the reunion. Luckily, the reunion had a website, but it was pretty basic. It didn’t tell me much more than the article had, but it did have something the article didn’t: a contact list. I clicked on it, scrolled down—and there it was: Dad’s name and phone number, with an area code I knew well because I’d had it, too: 718.

I grabbed my phone and dialed, but luckily I hung up before anyone answered. The website was old. He probably didn’t have the same number anymore. And even if he did, what was I going to say? Hi, it’s your daughter. I know it’s six o’clock in the morning, but would you mind if I came to New York? It was smarter to use the number to get his address and show up. Maybe he didn’t live there anymore, or maybe he did, and it would be this big homecoming, complete with apologies and answers. Offers to help and solutions. Everything I’d ever wanted to know about myself and all my episodes would come out in one glorious afternoon.

I imagined Dad explaining things to me, and it was exactly what I wanted to hear. There were reasons for everything, explanations that put things into place and—most important—would keep me out of the psych ward. We’d drink pink lemonade and float away on clouds and spend the rest of the trip getting to know each other again. He wouldn’t be crazy, and I wouldn’t be crazy, and Mom would fall in love with him again. They’d get back together, and the last four years would seem like a blip in an otherwise extraordinary life. Crossword puzzles and cereal, zoos and pancake faces, parasols and popcorn. No more fights, no more being apart—just us, like we used to be. Before the disappearing started.

I knew reunions were very rarely like that.

But I was going to New York anyway.